MADISON AVE

A few weeks ago, Robert David wrote a much‐needed article for this column entitled “The Boors of Business.” I read it and gleefully sent a copy to a remiss agency, knowing I could kiss the account good‐by and then sent a letter to Mr. David to tell him how much we film producers needed those words. In fact, we needed to see them almost as much as the advertising agencies needed to read them.

It is not my intent to compile a catalogue of the evils of advertising executives. I do know people in the business who are quite wonderful (some of my best friends?). Nor do I want to minimize the problems of a high‐pressure business (with or without three‐hour lunches), the deadlines, client conferences, the need to be constantly “creative.”

We, too, have our problems. We produce motion pictures for major corporations, yet we are in an overwhleming avalanche of telephone calls from actors and production managers and musicians and cameramen all looking for work. We speak to every caller—or we call back.

Our clients are the bluechip companies of America—yet it is easier to call the president of one of the largest airlines in the world than to get through to almost any level at an agency.

But it is not only the unreturned telephone call however annoying that may be It is a disease — a plague that seems to permeate the entire industry, and it seems to filter down to all levels. It has given advertising the well — deserved reputation (particularly among suppliers) of being a rude industry.

This problem is not a matter of sour grapes from suppliers who do very little or no business with agencies. Our few dealings with Madison Avenue over the years have been so distasteful that we have made it a policy not to look for work in the commercial field. And yet, the attitude is bad for us — and bad for a business that considers itself so creative, so open to new ideas.

We are a busy film company. Our record has been incredibly good over the years. We have five Academy Award nominations. Somewhere we had always felt that there was a common ground for us and the agencies. But that common ground always seems to be a mirage that turns into quicksand.

How many times have we been asked to screen our films, only to be told as we walked in that the person with whom we had an appointment was not there or, if he was there, that he would not be able to stay through the whole allowing?

These Are our babies! We have put our blood into the film we carry under our arms. Never in 15 years has a corporation executive come into a screening only to leave midway through. Perhaps our films are awful. Well, we have sat through hundreds of awful student films in order to find one little bit of potential talent. Someone has worked and struggled and sweated to produce those few minutes. He deserves our time.

The crux of the matter is again the image that advertising tries to put forward to the world. But, if the climate is rude, if the business has become depersonalized, if the people in It are unpleasant to everyone except the suppliers they need, or to their clients, is this a climate in which creative business can best be done?

Is it fair to use the supplier only as a shill? Is it fair to call for a quote on a job so that it can be compared with the ones already in the house or against the regular suppliers; is it fair to ask us or anyone else to put in 10 and 12 hours’ work at meetings and budget sessions on a storyboard — and then not have the courtesy to return our calls when we want to know the results?

After going through a week where I had met what I thought was a well‐rounded series of agency rebuffs and rudeness and discourtesy, the ultimate was thrown at us right before sitting down to write this article.

It had been quite a week. It had been a week where one secretary (also a victim of the disease) had never even notified her boss that we had called, though she more than made up for it in her display of a beautiful cold shoulder. (Well, that can happen.)

It was a week In which we had to meet a deadline for four Caribbean films for a major airline. It was a week in which two executives “forgot” we were on the other line waiting to speak to them. (Well, I suppose that can happen, too.)

It was a week in which we managed to plan and shoot for a large automobile company in Detroit. And it was a week in which an agency that seemed to be in love with us four weeks before would not return our calls of inquiry, though we tried twice a day and they were always “out.” (Well, I suppose they could have been out.)

It was also a week in which we saw 10 sample films, spoke to five outof‐work cameramen — and even answered all the messages on our desks when we came back from lunch.

But, early in this week, we received a call from an agency president who had an emergency and we had been recommended to him. Could we possibly rent them a cutting room for a day — or maybe even for a week? Certainly we could. What day? What time? We prepared the room for their arrival. We even cleaned it up. That morning I cancelled an appointment with a client — feeling that it was a courtesy to greet our guests personally, no matter how small the job. I went to the cutting room.

They never showed up.

I called the president and was told that he was on the phone. (To a client?) Finally, the young woman told me, “He whispered to me to tell you that he had to cancel.” In my coolest voice I told her that it would have been nice of him to let me know. He has yet to call and apologize.

In frustration, I turned to one of my partners and asked a rhetorical question: “Does a particular kind of person get into advertising? Or does advertisng make people the way they are?”

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